<p>Hello. I'm a high school senior trying to make my college decision; I'm new to this forum but I thought I might find some good input here.</p>
<p>My choices are Oberlin, Ohio University, George Washington, and University of Pittsburgh. Ohio University is no tuition, and the rest come out to about 20k a year, which for my family is manageable but certainly not an incentive.</p>
<p>Tentatively my plans are to major in English, then go on to graduate school to teach at the college level. If I go to OU (my father's alma mater) my parents would be able to help me fund graduate school, which is a definite plus. I also have several good friends who plan to attend the school. But I can't say I was impressed much by the intellectual caliber of the students there. </p>
<p>I just recently visited Oberlin for the first time and I found the students to be smart, interesting, and the kind of people I might fit in with. I liked the atmosphere and the professors seemed engaging.</p>
<p>I liked Pitt and GW, but maybe not enough for the 20k a year.</p>
<p>I enjoy intellectual conversations, can be somewhat awkward socially, and am an atheist and something of a leftist (but in a more libertarian, less PC kind of way), if any of that helps.</p>
<p>If Oberlin is 20K a year than I would go there over Pitt and GW, but Pitt is pretty strong in English their PhD program is ranked #27 nationally</p>
<p>I would go to Ohio, but if your parents can afford Oberlin and you excel there, then your parents might not have to fund grad school, because a high GPA at Oberlin (3.7 and above) very well might get you a PhD Fellowship.</p>
<p>If you’re thinking about a Ph.D. program you won’t need your parents to pay. You’ll receive fuding from the Ph.D. program. Of those schools Oberlin seems like the right fit.</p>
<p>Pointoforder is right: if you get into a good PhD program, you don’t have to worry about paying for it–the program itself will provide funding. Go to Oberlin.</p>
<p>Sadly I’m relatively ignorant of most graduate situations. Aren’t fellowships and programs of that nature in the humanities relatively uncommon? How do they work? And does anyone know how people adjust to social life at a small LAC like Oberlin?</p>
<p>Go to Oberlin!!! I was sooo impressed by Oberlin. I wish I could go. My best friend is going there and anywhere he goes is the BOMB. </p>
<p>Also, I’m not sure how happy you’d be at a place like Ohio U. If you have the money like you say then I’d seriously consider Oberlin. Normally I’d say beggar can’t be choosers but it seems to me like you have a choice. -</p>
<p>I’ve been told that even though humanities fellowships are more uncommon, the best graduate programs will still offer tuition remission/fellowships, etc. And if you’re going for a humanities Ph.D., you’d better have prestige to help you get a job afterwards.</p>
<p>Also, you sound like a perfect fit socially for Oberlin. Fellow atheist (but socialist, not libertarian) English major here–I loved Oberlin on my visit.</p>
<p>Graduate funding in most areas of humanities is limited, but English is usually an exception. At major universities, most freshman need to take English, thus there is a great need for English TAs. TAs usually get their tuition and a stipend, so you should be OK for grad school.</p>
<p>The top graduate schools (and you need to go to a top graduate school if you want to have a good chance of getting a job…the market is quite competitive) offer multi-year fellowships and/or TA’ships to their admittees. (if you don’t get one, you should not go…it takes many years and you would never be able to repay the loans, even if you got a job at the end of the process, but that is years away.)
Oberlin is far and away the best of your options for English and future graduate school. Two of the smartest and best prepared English graduate students I knew at UC Berkeley were from Oberlin. It has a first-rate English department (and excellent creative writing too), with a large faculty and number of majors (large relative to other departments, such as Classics and the language departments) and a history of sending top students to top graduate schools.</p>